Scientific mission to comet called off

The European Space Agency decided on 14 January 2003 to cancel the launch of its Rosetta spacecraft due to concerns about the reliability of the Ariane-5 rocket launcher. It had been planned to attempt to land the spacecraft on Comet Wirtanen in 2011. Scientists must now redesign the Rosetta mission to target a different comet at a later date.

http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Rosetta http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Rosetta

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